


Tibet (I, II, III)

by gloria_scott



Category: Sherlock Holmes - Arthur Conan Doyle
Genre: Alternate Canon, Drabble Sequence, Gen, Hiatus, Spiritual, Wordcount: 100-1.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-06-16
Updated: 2006-06-16
Packaged: 2017-10-19 23:10:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 306
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/206238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gloria_scott/pseuds/gloria_scott
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Holmes in Tibet during the Hiatus.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Tibet (I, II, III)

**Author's Note:**

> Playing fast and loose with canon, folks.

**I.**

Here I have no name – a pilgrim among pilgrims – weary ants climbing brown heights towards an impossibly blue sky. Colorful flags flap their prayers into the incessant wind. I miss the press of London’s streets, its grey sky cold and close and reassuring. In this place of lawless nature, gravity abandons me and I have a sudden fear of falling; not down upon the jagged rocks, but rather up, into that boundless expanse of sky.

I cast my eyes upon the ground, trying in vain to remain a fixed point, while the earth spins off its axis beneath my feet.

 **II**

The clarity of the air infects my brain, revealing stone truths. My life has been a set of Russian boxes, the close confines and well-worn contours of each comfort me: London's blighted alleyways…Baker Street's walls…Paganini’s music…the criminal's mind. I know them so well that to others it seems uncanny, genius.

 _And yet, there are also those shut fast, hidden deep; their exact dimensions and contents remain a mystery I haven't the skill to solve._

Half a world away, I carry them all with me still. But what use are boxes for unlocking truth, when what I lack is a key?

 **III.**

 _Do you have a question?_

Saffron robes, face creased like a walnut, hands folded in his lap.

I thought to probe this monk for his secrets, as I deftly probed my clients for theirs. In his gaze I catch a glimpse of something eternal, and my assuredness recedes. Suddenly, I am an acolyte at my brother's knee. My carefully worded questions scatter, and with the petulance of a child I cry, "Why must there be such evil in the world?"

 _The world is perfect. You observe, but you do not see._

I close my eyes, grasp the key, fall up.


End file.
